Oman Air plans to order Airbus A350XWB instead of Boeing 787-10, sources

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Muskat - Oman Air is close to ordering new widebodies as the fleet expands. The airline has been evaluating the Boeing 787-10 and Airbus A350XWB for a while for future fleet expansion.

Last June, chief executive officer Abdulaziz Al Raisi has revealed plans of the Gulf carrier about renewing its widebody fleet.

The national carrier of Oman wants to replace some of its aging A330s with new devices. The state-owned company thinks that the next-generation widebody aircraft with higher capacity are best-suited to the airline's expanding network. Oman Air management is currently working on a dozen possible new route launches next year.

After nearly two years of evaluation, the operator is likely to order Airbus A350XWB instead of Boeing 787-10 German news portal aero.de reports. On the other hand, another Gulf carrier, Etihad Airways to reduce an existing order for Airbus A350XWBs.

Airbus is closer to receive an order from Oman Air, mainly because of the common type rating of the Airbus A330 and the A350 said an insider to aero.de.

Airbus has intensively courted Oman Air during this period. Muscat was one of the airports that an Airbus A350-1000 prototype visited in January 2018 on a world tour to introduce the aircraft to the potential customer.

European manufacturer's order book could be rearranged just before the end of the year while Oman Air plans to order the aircraft and Etihad Airways considers a reduction in its order for 40 A350-900 and 22 A350-1000.

Besides ten Airbus A330, Oman Air also operates five Boeing 737-900ER, five 737 MAX 8, three 787-8 and five 787-9.